


Life Lessons

by domesticadventures



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Coda, Episode: s12e02 Mamma Mia, Gen, Headspace
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-25
Updated: 2016-10-25
Packaged: 2018-08-24 13:31:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,113
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8373988
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/domesticadventures/pseuds/domesticadventures
Summary: Sam has been thinking, lately, about wanting to live.





	

Sam has been thinking, lately, about wanting to live.

Not that he hasn’t thought about it before, that is. He’s thought about living in the same way he’s thought about dying. He’s thought of it as his duty, thought of continuing to struggle and fight not out of any sense of self-preservation but simply out of a twisted sense of obligation to the world. He’s forced himself to carry on in order to solve problems caused by cosmic forces, by his friends and family, by himself.

This time, though? He hasn’t been thinking about it out of some misplaced devotion to the job or some lingering sense of guilt for debts left unpaid. He’s been thinking about wanting to live for its own sake. For _his_ own sake.

He wakes from the dream about Toni, the violation of it, wakes to his foot throbbing and his head aching, his skin itching after hours spent coated in sweat and blood, and finds he isn’t resigned like he’s grown so used to expecting. Instead, he’s angry. The world has already taken so much from him. He’s already given so much -- his friends, his family, most of his life. He’ll be damned if he’s going to give up the rest of the life he has left. He deserves better than that.

_I want to live,_ he thinks, easily, immediately, like there’s never been a time when that wasn’t the case.

\--

Sam is used to pain without purpose. He is used to a life that feels like one endless string of suffering with no end in sight. He knows that bad things happen to bad people and good people alike, that they happen for any reason or no reason.

He knows, logically, that there was no point to the pain he was so recently experiencing. There are things that can grant wishes and make dreams come true, and torture has never been one of them. He knows it was not his suffering that brought his family back from the dead, that there is no connection between the two, no real cause and effect.

He can’t help what he’s feeling, though: that for once, his suffering had purpose.

For once, it was finally worth it.

\--

He can’t seem to take his eyes off her.

“Sam?” Mary says, catching him in the act. “You keep looking at me like I’m going to explode.”

“Sorry,” he says, because he doesn’t know how to explain. He knows himself well enough to know that he’s not simply watching her for the sake of watching her, that he’s not just trying to make up for lost time. He knows there’s some part of him that’s looking for a tell -- some trick of the light, some sudden shift, that will give her away as ghost or hallucination.

He knows she isn’t, though. Every second that goes by makes her feel more and more real. Everything she does -- every time Dean looks at her with a mix of awe and trepidation, every time she talks and Dean responds, every time she moves a chair or picks up a fork -- is more proof that she’s actually, irrevocably _here._

Sam feels his heart beating in his chest and blood rushing in his ears. He feels giddy and lightheaded with the pure joy of it -- of her presence, of the simple pleasure of sharing a meal with his family.

He feels alive in a way he hasn’t in a long, long time.

\--

Sam may not know Mary, but he knows exactly how rare second chances are when you lead the type of life he’s led. He knows exactly how precious this opportunity is, and he doesn’t intend to waste it.

Dean may have been old enough when she died to remember her after the fact, but Mary has never existed as anything other than an absence in Sam’s life. He spent his entire life telling himself he didn’t miss her, but all of that went out the window the second she showed up in that basement. He sees them constantly, now, all those empty spaces in his life where she would have fit. He feels the loss of every touch, every conversation, every birthday and holiday. He aches with the loss of all of those things.

Beyond the few things he learned from Dean and John, Mary is a blank slate to him. He doesn’t know what time she likes to go to bed, doesn’t know what she likes to drink, doesn’t know if she saw the parts of John that Sam and Dean spent years trying to weather. Part of him wants to ask Dean, to find out if he has the answers Sam is craving so he can make a good impression, but he sees the way Dean is tiptoeing around her. He knows it isn’t a good time.

He also knows what it feels like to feel out of place, to feel like you’re on the outside, and if he can do anything to help change that, he’s going to.

Sam doesn’t know how to have a mother. He supposes, when he thinks about how his life has been, that he doesn’t really know how to be a son, either. But he wants to give it his best shot.

\--

Sam may have mixed feelings about his father, but when he goes to tell Mary goodnight, he brings John’s journal along with the cup of tea he’s so carefully prepared. He knows that whatever the journal meant to him, whatever blanks it filled in for better or for worse, it will mean even more to Mary. If she can gain even some small amount of comfort from it, from having some piece of the man she once knew and loved, he wants her to have it. He’s willing to let her have this, even if it means keeping his feelings to himself for a while.

There will be time for that later, he knows. There will be time for them to get to know each other, to make this new life together.

For the barest moment, when Mary hugs him, Sam misses never having had the opportunity to feel small compared to her. He knows he’s never going to have that chance. They’re never going to get back all the years that were stolen from them.

Still, standing in his home, holding his mother in his arms, Sam knows he’s been given something precious -- the first hug out of many where they’re on even footing. Where they can start over fresh. Where they’re here. They’re alive. They’re together.

Sam wants to live, and he wants to spend the rest of his life learning everything about her.


End file.
